Idiot Box

What Are You Doing New Year’s Eve?

NYE around the dial

By Devin D. O’Leary

Really, when you think about it, New Year’s Eve is the most anticlimactic holiday. You sit around drinking and waiting for that crucial hour and then, with a lot of fanfare and a little bit of off-key singing ... nothing happens. Turns out, 12 a.m. Jan. 1, 2007, is no different than 11:59 p.m. Dec. 31, 2006. What a gyp.

Well, if you’re looking for things to fill up the long hours of your New Year’s Eve, there’s always good old TV.

Countdown With Clint (AMC 3:30 a.m.) is a rip-roarin’ good way to start whiling away the hours until midnight and beyond. Put on your cowboy hat and catch tons of classic Clint cinema--from For a Few Dollars More to Pale Rider.

Of course, you could strap on your grills and hip-hip in the New Year with an all-day countdown of the year’s most crunk-tacular videos. “Notarized: Top 100 Video Countdown” (BET 9 a.m.) is a good bet forconnoisseurs of fine booty and should provide plenty of rump-shaking beats if you feel like hopping on your couch and busting a move.

Music lovers can also check out “MTV New Year’s” (MTV 4 p.m.) featuring all the hottest bands and biggest pop celebrities coming to you from the center of the action: Times Square.

“Law & Order” Marathon (TNT 10 a.m.) If your taste runs to the more, shall we say, forensic, then TNT’s crime-time marathon is probably what your looking for. Of course, if you get bored of “L&O,” you can flip over to the “CSI” Marathon (Spike 3 p.m.) for more of the same.

Tweens can spend the night vegetating with “New Year’s Ever TeeNICK” (Nickelodeon, 4 p.m.). Not only can you find out what new shows will be invading Nick in 2007, but you get musical performances, reruns of your favorite TeeNICK shows and the wit and wisdom of host Little JJ! Kids can also hang out at the New Year’s Eve Movie Marathon (Starz 4 p.m.) watching films like Sky High, Zathura, Are We There Yet? and The Pacifier.

Laugh in the New Year Seinfeld Special (TBS 4 p.m.) is exactly what it sounds like, a marathon of “Seinfeld” episodes. New Year’s Eve Rock-A-Thon (Comedy Central 8 p.m.) is a mini-marathon of “South Park” episodes to ring in 2007. Feel free to chose your laugh poison.

Of course, what would the evening be without “Dick Clark’s New Year’s Rockin’ Eve” (KOAT-7 9 p.m.)? Dick will be there in Times Square, giving it his post-stroke best, waiting for the ball to drop, introducing pop acts and letting Ryan Seacrest pick up the slack.